


Ginnungagap – Stories from the Yawning Void

by CarrionStar



Category: Destiny (Video Games)
Genre: Gen, I treat this as if it could exist in-game as a lore tab, I won't count all of them in because I don't want to clutter the tags, OC lore book, There are other characters, canon characters mostly as background but as canon-compliant as possible, canon typical death and dying, mostly OCs
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-06
Updated: 2021-02-06
Packaged: 2021-03-18 03:54:45
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 9
Words: 3,569
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29237163
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CarrionStar/pseuds/CarrionStar
Summary: This is a "lore book" about my Destiny 2 character, Wyrd-9. She's an Exo Warlock. I do not headcanon her as the Young Wolf and I try to keep my story canon-compliant when it comes to events and the background lore. I'm a lore nerd so. It's mostly about OCs, with canon characters appearing in the background.Some characters are connected to the work of CoyoteStar, so for a full experience check their OC lore book as well!https://archiveofourown.org/users/CoyoteStarWyrd-9 has been through a lot and all of it is a metaphorical mythological journey.
Kudos: 1





	1. Jotunheim

The Old Man peered into the wisdoms from beyond the void and she sat beneath his feet as the void answered.

To become giants, they would have to venture into the depth of howling ice. From their knowledge, the rest could carve up the future of humanity.

But a prize such as the one they craved came with a heavy price.

Disassembled and torn apart, she sat at the great well of knowledge and looked at the figure obscured by the swaying veil. She gazed into the deep once, twice, a million times over.

Test after test, sacrifice after sacrifice, as the Old Man cheered her on.

Beyond the pain, there were infinite worlds to explore, if only one would have enough time.

Beyond the cold, opportunities to find what she sought for.

In her dreams, a tall tree with a castle in its branches and rotten roots led humanity away onto a journey. But first they must pass through the ice.

First, she must drink at the well of wisdom with the Old Man.

Then she must die and wake up.

_You must shed your skin and be born anew. Taste of the sweet nourishment that once was life and now is your blood. Wrap your heart in metal and give yourself to the ice. And I will breathe the life into your new bones._

The first time she woke up, she stared at the Old Man in terror, unable to speak, unable to move. Her brain sizzled on the table next to her.

The second time she woke up, she was trapped in sarcophagus of stone, buried alive.

Third time, a wave of blood drowned her.

A hundredth time, the Old Man yelled at someone behind her as she tore her eyes and crushed them into scraps of glass.

Beyond the pain, beyond the cold, the tree glistened outside of the void she was contained within. _Extend your soul and touch the worlds ahead._

A millionth time she woke up, eyes as blue as the ice stared back at her as the Old Man adjusted the spikes adorning her head like a crown.

“Now you stand at the shoulders of a giant who ushered you into the future of humanity,” the Old Man told her. “Go forth and fight for our victory. You cannot be defeated.”

She snatched a spike from the hand of a machine that posed as the Old Man and ran it into his eye.

Pushing the scrap of metal to the side, she walked forward with single-minded purpose of breaking through the glass separating her from the Old Man. She managed to punch the glass once before an army of unknown creatures broke into her cage in unison.

As they pulled her body apart, the liquid that posed as her blood defied gravity itself to move back into the creatures, as if ordered by them to do so.

Drained and discarded, the creatures moved on.

The Old Man returned to her, this time in person. She saw him inspecting her and weighing his words.

“We will have to purify the radiolaria more. Dispose of this and prepare her for another upload. One million and one time’s the charm, perhaps?”

_> >> System reboot complete._

_> >>Welcome—Error. Data insufficient. Designated number: 2. Name: not_found._

_> >>Name reconstruction: pending_


	2. Myrkheim

In your dreams, you see us.

_In your dreams, you have succeeded._

_You exist on a field of gold._

_Home is calling you. Calling you to come back._

_Let me show you._

She snapped awake. No trace of any fields of gold. No trace of anything. Embraced by nothingness, she floated through the void until her feet touched the ground.

Beneath her, a sickly green light flashed the world into existence.

Tetrahedrons hovering in the darkened skies above the green hues of auroras.

Dark towers rising to the heavens, bending to the otherworldly winds. Only one standing still, among the distant hills.

She stepped forward, first walking, then running. No matter how fast, the tower among the distant hills never got within reach.

Veiled figures passed her by. Statues of veiled figures cackled as she ran. Their oily black veils swayed in the wind.

Green geysers seeped gas from the bowels of the earth.

A tetrahedron shifted in the sky.

_We must depart now._

_There are worlds to conquer. Worlds to devour._

_You can find us in the emptiness between existences._

_Our whispers will speak to you._

_Long and slow._

_> >> System reboot complete._

_> >>Welcome—Error. Data insufficient. Designated number: 3. Name: not_found._

_> >>Name reconstruction: pending… Updating…_


	3. Niflheim

Back to the cold ravines and endless glowing cubes, she gasped as crystals of ice formed over her mechanical body.

“Up, up, _up!_ ” A voice yelled.

Up she went, running in deep snow reaching up to her waist.

Painful. Ice sneaking into her joints like knives.

Her feet growing phantom blisters. Her knees cracking as the freezing temperatures pinned her down once more.

She swam through the deep, through the storm, snow-blind. In the distance, lights of her enemies loomed as supernovas.

Around her, brothers and sisters, mothers and fathers, all rushing to stop the endless swarm of metal.

Only metal could fight it back. It’s what they said.

Ahead, leading the charge, a woman with a heavy pulse rifle and a man with a buzzing sword on fire. She had to follow them. They had to win this futile war for a desert of ice.

And when the mist has settled, there was nothing left but the pulsing portal, calling her back. Calling them all back.

A door shut in front of her. Then another. And another. Until the gateway to the end of the world was sealed.

Her arms ached. Where there should have been frostbite, there was nothing but the idea of it.

It still hurt all the same.

She searched deep within and heard the call of something beyond the end of the world. They all did.

The dark tower still waited among the distant hills.

_At the roots of the world, Striker in the Dark nibbles at your reality._

_Now you must sink._   
  


_> >> System reboot complete._

_> >>Welcome—Error. Data insufficient. Designated number: 4. Name: not_found._

_> >>Name reconstruction: pending… Updating… W—Error. Data insufficient._


	4. Helheim

_The void screeched through the vast of night._

_At the edge of the solar system, sharp knives pierced the dark._

_A voice, drenched in death, spoke:_

_“I have come to show you that what you’ve made belongs to me.”_

_A voice, unknown, cried in terror:_

_“And I will die before I let you flay them.”_

She watched the world ending from a ship in the sky.

For such a small, insignificant dot in the sky, its end made an awful lot of noise.

The ship struggled to fly against the gravitational wave pulling it back and the screams only stopped once they hit the eye of the storm.

Beneath them, water rushed through land and land broke apart.

Hurricanes tore cities from the ground and billions drowned beneath the waves.

A serene white sphere stood in place, petrified as chaos reigned underneath. And when death came for it, the sphere moved.

For no purpose other than habit, the Exo shielded her eyes when an explosion lit the sky.

Screams resumed.

Ship went down.

As they soared back towards the Earth, she watched the inconceivable dark knives rending through the planet’s poles, releasing the flood. She watched a continent snap in half like freshly baked bread she used to remember eating.

Their ship crashed into a rainforest on fire, tearing it open with a blast.

Then finally, there was silence.

_> >> System reboot complete._

_> >>Welcome—Error. Data insufficient. Designated number: 5. Name: not_found._

_> >>Name reconstruction: pending… Updating… Data found! Data restricted!_

_> >>Wy—Error… Error…_


	5. Midgard

“Can you hear me?”

The voice came from a drone.

“Yes?” She replied as if the drone had just interrupted her in very important business of being dead.

“I am your Ghost.”

The Exo shot upward, to her feet. She saw a floating drone with a bright eye and instinctively lunged towards it with her fist.

The drone moved away before her fist could reach it. “I will not be defeated!” She yelled.

“We are not in a fight? I am your Ghost. I revived you. You were dead.”

“Oh.”

The Exo lowered her arms, as if the conversation she just had was a completely normal interaction. She somehow knew that the drone was correct. She _was_ dead.

She looked around and saw hundreds of ancient vehicles piled up on top of each other. In the distance, a wall.

“Ghost!” She demanded. “Where are we?”

“We are in the Cosmodrome. We should head to the Last City. I have instructions to bring new Guardians there.”

“Guardians?”

“That’s you.”

“What am I Guardianing?”

The drone sighed which was impressive for a drone. “Humanity. Now let’s go.”

_Humanity. Your home, your people. Squashed and demolished and yet they stand!_

“What did you say?”

“That we have to go.”

The Exo attempted to scratch her head and stabbed herself. Carefully, she touched around spikes protruding from her scalp. She made a step forward, dropped through the rusted roof of an abandoned vehicle and felt searing pain through her leg as it twisted. She blacked out instantly.

_> >> System reboot complete._

_> >>Welcome—Error. Data insufficient. Designated number: 6. Name: not_found._

_> >>Name reconstruction: pending… Updating… Data found!_

_> >>Wyrd._


	6. Muspelheim

Alone in a world of fire, Wyrd did not hesitate to fight. Or to die. It came to her as an instinct. She has already fought, she knew it. Somewhere a long time ago. She fought and she won.

And she will do it again.

Against piercing arc staves that stabbed through her in agonising blue energy. Blue, like her eyes and her spikes.

She fought with what she had. Her fists. Her head. Her legs.

The first time she rammed her head into a Fallen dreg, all others ran away in terror.

But the trick became stale.

“You have Light. Why don’t we go to the City so you can learn from the others?”

“I don’t need to learn from the others, Hagal.”

Her Ghost, Hagal, has already gotten used to this behaviour, but he kept trying. Wyrd may have fought some battles of old, but she was not alive for the recent ones. She wasn’t there when Light disappeared and thousands died in an instant. Just like the Collapse all over again. He told her about the Red War, but he doubted she understood, or even listened.

Currently, she was rummaging through an abandoned burning campsite. She found clothes to replace her old ones. There was a pulse rifle with some ammo left. And a sword. Familiar.

Wyrd shrugged as she stashed the items away and stepped into the fire to find more.

“What are you doing?!” Hagal yelled after her.

“I want to check the rest of the camp.”

“You are going to die!”

Wyrd stopped and turned slowly. Raising her metaphorical eyebrow. “Okay? You will revive me.”

Flames licked at her heels. Fire singed her clothes away and danced over the tissue covering her metallic body. Strangely, the pain was almost identical to that of the biting cold.

She was used to both. She remembered the world of ice. One type of pain swapped for another. It didn’t matter. Now she lived in a world of fire.

Out of the burning rubble, she dragged a box of supplies before succumbing to the wounds. The black-out was instant.

_> >>System reboot complete._

_> >>Welcome Wyrd-7._


	7. Alfheim

Within weeks, it became obvious that Earth wasn’t a single forest with some ruins. She ventured further towards the walls and away from the hostile aliens.

She would pass others like her by. They wore nicer clothes and better weapons. Hagal would see her jealousy and urge her to go to the City, but she would always refuse.

She watched others fight and she would try to mimic them. It would not go well.

“What is that one over there doing?” She asked, pointing at a bulky man running into a Fallen Captain at full speed.

“That’s a Titan. He is shoulder charging.”

The Fallen’s shield burst away and the Captain disintegrated into nothingness.

“I want to do that.”

Wyrd jumped from her rock and headed into the direction of the Titan. Hagal stared in disbelief. She was not a Titan. From what he could tell so far, she was a Warlock in every aspect. When she did resort to using Light instead of her fists, she would drop pools of warming Light that soothed both body and mind. Sometimes she would struggle with pulling a grenade from the void, but if she did, it would charge longer and destroy faster.

By the time Hagal got to his senses, Wyrd was already speaking to the Titan. They were, for some reason, crouching and then getting back to full height in a rapid manner. As mind-boggled as he was, Hagal was happy that she was finally interacting with her own kind. Unfortunately, she did exactly what she said she would do. She asked the Titan to show her—

“Wyrd!”

She nodded and flailed her arms, beckoning him, as the Titan ran at her. Hagal did not get to her in time to transmat her away before the Titan smashed his shoulder into her and Wyrd’s body floated into the sky as dust. With a heavy sigh, Hagal brought her back, at the same time listening to the Titan apologising.

Wyrd was enchanted. She asked him to show her again. And again. And again. Hagal got increasingly worried but then she thanked the Titan and walked away.

“You’ve had enough?” He asked.

“Yes. I’ll try it out now.”

Wyrd found a nearest dreg and ran at him. Full speed, shoulders forward, calling for the Light to aid her.

She didn’t reach the dreg. A blast from its rocket killed her not two seconds later.

_> >>System reboot complete._

_> >>Welcome Wyrd-8._


	8. Vanaheim

Hagal did not know enough about Exos, much like other Ghosts.

Wyrd did not know how to explain why her number was changing so frequently.

She just continued avoiding the City and other Guardians, adamantly practising shoulder charges. She had not yet succeeded performing one.

In her latest scavenging run, she found herself closer to the City than she liked, but her trail led her there. She found discarded armours and weapons, hoarding them in a nearby cave she found. Most of the armours were too big for her. Most of the weapons did not work.

“You can find so much more in the City,” Hagal insisted.

“No, these are perfectly fine and also free,” Wyrd replied, donning shoulder pads bigger than her entire torso.

Next time she shoulder charges, she will have the same gear as Titans.

Next time she shoulder charged, Hagal was scooping up her remains and assembling her back together. It appeared that whatever she hit did not want to cooperate.

“I am so sorry. My Guardian…” she heard Hagal speaking as she was brought back to life. “She is just like this. She didn’t mean to damage your sparrow. She wasn’t attacking anyone.”

Wyrd picked up her broken pauldrons and emptied them of stuff she put inside so they wouldn't slide off her body. Boxes, tools, ammo crates, books, all of it dropped and scattered around her feet. One piece of trash rolled off down the road and bumped a parked sparrow which had a massive dent on the side. Wyrd walked over to pick up an ornate orb, but someone else already picked it up before her.

“This is from the Dreaming City,” the woman in front of Wyrd said. She was dressed in purple and had a cloak. Hagal told Wyrd that Hunters have cloaks. Unfortunately, Hunters did not have any cool tricks to teach her.

Wyrd tried to snatch the orb back. “I found it, it’s mine.”

The woman moved and kept the orb firmly in her hands. She opened up her helmet and Wyrd saw purple skin. Awoken. Strange people. “Where did you find this?”

“Around. People lose a lot of things beneath the City walls.”

“They don’t _lose_ these things, they accidentally drop them,” Hagal interjected.

“What’s the difference? I find things and I take them,” Wyrd replied.

The Awoken Hunter sized Wyrd up. “You have more things?” Wyrd crossed her arms and pouted. The Awoken laughed. “You remind me of someone I know.”

“Give me my orb back.”

“Yep, definitely like someone I know.”

Wyrd leapt towards the Hunter without warning but instead of getting into a fight with her, Wyrd just hit the sparrow once more and rolled off into the dirt. The Hunter was perched on a nearby wall, still holding the orb, spinning it on her finger.

“Give it back.”

“If you show me the rest of your stuff,” the Hunter replied. “I will also show you my stuff. We both seem to enjoy finding things in the wild.”

Wyrd considered. On one hand, she will get her orb back. On the other hand, she will have to lead this Hunter into her den of stuff. And on the other _other_ hand, she will see _more_ stuff.

“Okay,” Wyrd said.

The Hunter dropped from the wall and tossed the orb towards Wyrd. The Exo caught it, still lying in the dirt.

“My name is Davan,” the Hunter said and extended her arm to the Warlock.

“Wyrd.”

Their hands touched and Darkness sang.

Wyrd’s mind became a whirlwind of images, both past and future. Or so she could assume. A stream of unknown lands and unknown people. Loud languages arguing across centuries. Distant stars and floating discs and a tower among the hills of green fumes.

_There you are._

_And you found friends._

_We will devour them all this time._

Wyrd felt their touch break and she saw the Hunter, Davan, stumbling backwards, before she herself dropped to the ground lifelessly.

_> >>System reboot complete._

_> >>Welcome Wyrd-9._


	9. Asgard

“Where did you find her?”

“Outside the wall, stealing.”

“And she’s never been to the City before?”

“Nope. But she found so many things and I need to run them by Azira. What is a Dreaming City Oracle Engine orb doing here? I can’t let this stay here.”

“All right. You will take her stuff to Azira. Jay will go with you. I will deal with the rookie.”

Wyrd was sitting in a cozy office and staring at people around her. Her Hunter friend just decided to steal all of her stuff and hand it over to someone named Azira. With her, there was an Awoken Titan, jumping on the spot and sparkling with arc energy.

In front of her, at the office table, another Titan. He was by far the biggest person in the room. Pitch black face plated Exo with terrifying red glow spreading through his mouth when he spoke. An entire fluffy pelt at his back and largest pauldrons Wyrd had ever seen. His eyes were blood red fire. 

In a second, she forgot about her stuff, the thieving Hunter and even the strange visions that quite literally caused her to die and reboot.

She wanted to be like that Titan.

He looked at her and she almost jumped out of the chair. “I will assign you to training and evaluation before we—“

“Yes! I want to train,” she interrupted the Titan. He stared at her with the type of shock on his face only an Exo could pull. “I’ve been practising shoulder charging in my free time.”

The Titan put a cup of tea carefully onto its plate, crossed his arms and leaned onto the table. “I am Null-3 and you will address me as such. You will not interrupt me when I’m speaking to you. You are also a Warlock and you will not be training shoulder charging.”

“Yes I will!” Wyrd replied and only then noticed that she was in the process of climbing onto the table in front of Null.

“This is the Tower in the Last City of humanity, not your cave in the wilds. You will behave as is expected from a Guardian.”

“Okay! But I want to train with you. I will _not_ disappoint you. I will never be late and I will do everything you say!”

Wyrd-9 was now fully perched on the table, utterly dwarfed by Null regardless. The Titan stared in disbelief. She could see that something inside of him was calculating. She did not know what it was, but it was definitely something.

Finally, Null uncrossed his arms and leaned back into his chair. “Fine,” he said with a heavy sigh that reminded Wyrd of Hagal.

Two hours later, she was standing on top of the Tower in the Last City of humanity, dressed in pitch black and red Warlock armour, overlooking the vastness of the city she was now tasked to protect unconditionally.

In the back of her mind, there was a memory older than the world, of a cold distant place, of an Old Man, of wisdoms untold, of experiments and battles, of flesh and bone she used to have.

She knew she will see all of it again. The Hunter, Davan, told her so. Not directly, but she told her. They will go back and they will unseal the secrets from their tomb.

She will hear the whispers again and she will see her ancient homeland where the stars do not die.


End file.
